Notes

Autumn had always loved mirrors. Not because she was vain, but because she would see the most wonderful thing sometimes. Her own face would not be reflected, but rather it would be someone else’s. She had been five at the time, standing on the tool to brush her teeth in the sink. However, as she bent down to fill her mouth with water, she straightened up and screamed. A face stared back at her, but it wasn’t hers. There was no long, blonde hair or violet eyes, no fluffy pajamas. She had been terrified, but soon accepted the other face as an imaginary friend.
They would talk to each other, and learned that they would only see each other if they were both in front of the mirror at the same time. The other person in the mirror always made her day, telling jokes and experiences that he had gone through while they were apart. When she was seven, however, her parents began to show worry. They did not see the other child in the mirror, under the impression that their child was unable to let go of their imaginary friend.
After some sessions with a therapist, Autumn decided to drop the topic. She would no longer talk about her friend at the dinner table, pretending that she no longer saw her friend. But she would still meet him at the mirror, talking to him about her day and grinning. Her friend never went away as she aged, instead growing with her.
Now she was seventeen, in her junior year of highschool. Today she was excited, as she was going out for a date with a fellow student. Sure, she had had her crush on the friend of the mirror, but they were both under the impression that the other was just an imaginary friend, a hallucination that wouldn’t go away--not an actual person who lived in another country.
Stepping into the bathroom, she reached up onto a shelf to grab a bag that held her make-up. She rarely dolled up, typically wearing sweatshirts and just pulling her hair up instead of doing anything with it. But today was a special occasion. The blonde was shy, withdrawn, so the fact that she had been asked out thrilled her. So when she looked over and saw her friend in the mirror, she gave a small huff before giving a small smile.
“I can only talk for a little bit today. I got asked out, and I can’t really do my make-up when I can’t see my face.”